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Eloy office earns high level recognition for PCMH

June 24th, 2015

ELOY - Yet another of Sun Life Family Health Center’s offices in Pinal County received the official Level 3 recognition, the highest possible, for the Patient-Centered Medical Home 2011 (PCMH) program this month.

Eloy received this recognition recently from The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) for using evidence-based, patient-centered processes that focus on highly coordinated care and long-term participative relationships.

Sun Life's offices in Coolidge, San Manuel, and Casa Grande have achieved Level 3 status in the last few years, with Maricopa achieving Level 2.

The patient-centered medical home is a model of care emphasizing care coordination and communication to transform primary care into ‘what patients want it to be.’ Research shows that medical homes can lead to higher quality and lower costs, and improve patients’ and providers’ reported experiences of care.

The PCMH identifies practices that promote partnerships between individual patients and their personal clinicians, instead of treating patient care as the sum of several episodic office visits. Each patient’s care is tended to by clinician-led care teams, who provide for all the patient’s health care needs and coordinate treatments across the health care system. Medical home clinicians demonstrate the benchmarks of patient-centered care, including open scheduling, expanded hours and appropriate use of proven health information systems.

“The patient-centered medical home raises the bar in defining high-quality care by emphasizing access, health information technology and partnerships between clinicians and patients,” said NCQA President Margaret E. O’Kane. “PCMH Recognition shows that Sun Life Family Health Center has the tools, systems, and resources to provide their patients with the right care at the right time.”

To receive recognition, which is valid for three years, Sun Life demonstrated the ability to meet the program’s key elements embodying characteristics of the medical home. The standards are aligned with the joint principles of the Patient-Centered Medical Home established with the American College of Physicians, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Osteopathic Association. Sun Life met key program components in the following areas:

·Written standards for patient access and continuity of care

·Use of patient feedback materials

·Appropriate use of charting tools to track patients and organize clinical information

·Responsive care management techniques with an emphasis on preventative care for individual patients and for the entire patient population

·Adaption to patient’s cultural and linguistic needs

·Use of information technology for prescriptions, test, and referral tracking and coordination with other health care providers

·Use of evidence-based guidelines to treat chronic conditions

·Measurement and reporting of clinical and service performance

To find other clinicians and their practices that have been recognized by the Patient-Centered Medical Home 2011 program, visit http://recognition.ncqa.org. For further information, contact NCQA customer support at (888) 275-7585.